Upheaval Arts, the mod team behind the StarCraft Universe project --with the absurdly ambitious goal of creating a World of Warcraft style MMO in StarCraft fiction-- have released their first taste of the game to the public, launching a rather impressive single-player prologue on the Battle.net Blizzard Arcade.

We're excited to release the single-player Prologue of our game designed to introduce you to our story, and teach you how to play!

StarCraft Universe takes place in an alternate timeline, 11 years after the events which transpire in the 'In Utter Darkness scenario of the StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty campaign. It's our vision of how the universe may have been for any survivors of the hybrid onslaught which ensued, had Kerrigan died.

If you're curious why we're only releasing the single-player content, it's because we need to release this project slowly to ensure all of our core systems work properly. This project is a massive undertaking, which completely alters the way the SC2 engine operates, and we're a very small team without a big QA department. YOU guys will be our quality assurance!

Multiplayer content has been in development for a while now, and we hope to bring you some in a few months if this release runs smoothly.

You don't even have to download the mod to be impressed by their efforts, just check out the launch trailer the team released for the launch of the prologue below.

The announcement also calls for community donations to help the project continue, but more than just panhandling, the team's official website actually features an assortment of crowdfunding backer tiers, with a variety of founders packages ranging from $5 to $100.

StarCraft Universe - Chronicles of Fate Prologue can be located in the Blizzard Arcade, via a quick search for "Universe".